The It List: Five things to do in Berkeley this weekend

THROUGH A LENS, SHARPLY In the mid 1960s, in honor of the University of California’s centennial in 1968, President Clark Kerr hired the renowned photographer, Ansel Adams, to take photos of the system. Adams trekked throughout the university’s far-flung campuses to shoot a series of photos documenting its students, professors, labs, and buildings. The images were published in a 1967 book, Fiat Lux. The Bancroft Library is exhibiting rarely seen images from that work and is hosting a opening exhibition reception Thursday, Sept. 27 from 5 to 7 pm. The show accompanies On the Same Page, a program that presents all new Cal students and faculty with one book to talk about, in this case, Fiat Lux. The Bancroft exhibition runs through Feb. 28, 2013.

CLUCK, CLUCK, AND TASTE Even though it is located in an old gas station at the intersection of Ashby and Sacramento, Biofuel Oasis is all about locally raised, locally consumed food. On Saturday, Sept. 29, it will host its Harvest Tasting Festival, where visitors can taste honey, mead, kombucha, and kimchi, pet chickens, see a fermentation demonstration, and vote on the best East Bay honey and most beautiful chicken and egg. At 1 pm there will be a “Chick Day Reunion,” where chicken owners who got chicks at Biofuel can get together. Local residents are invited to submit their honey and eggs for competition (but enter by 7 pm today). The Harvest festival runs from noon to 4 pm at 1441 Ashby Ave.

YE POETRY LOVERS, GATHER HERE Every year for the past 16 years, poets have been gathering to share their work at the Watershed Environmental Poetry Festival, put on in conjunction with 1000 Poets for Change and the Ecology Center. For the 17th annual festival, which will take place from noon to 4:30pm Saturday, Sept. 27 in Civic Center Park, Robert Hass, a Pulitzer Prize winner and former UC Poet Laureate, will join Joy Harjo, a Native American poet, Brenda Hillman, Michael McClure, Francisco X. Alarcon, Rebecca Faust, and students from the Poetry Inside Out Center, among other appearances. The festival is dedicated to the late Ernest Callenbach, author of Ecotopia. There is a walk, too, from Strawberry Creek to the Farmers’ Market.

ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR, WHAT AM I FIGHTING FOR?Country Joe McDonald moved to Berkeley to go to school in the 1960s, but soon spent much of his time playing music, often at the Jabberwock Coffee House on Telegraph Avenue. He and Barry Melton formed Country Joe and the Fish, which became a seminal psychedelic rock protest band during the Vietnam War. Country Joe rocketed to national attention at the Woodstock Festival in 1969 when he sang his call-and-response song “I-Feel-Like-Like-I’m-Fixin’-To-Die Rag.” Now, 33 albums, 40 years, and numerous bands later, Country Joe has put together a tribute to his life, much like the tributes he created about Woody Guthrie and Florence Nightingale. At his debut performance Sat., Sept. 27 at 7pm at Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists (get tickets here), County Joe will sing songs and talk about his adventure-filled life. Parental discretion advised.

I WANT TO BE FREE The annual Cal Performance Fall Free for All runs from 11am to 6pm Sunday at various sites on the UC Berkeley campus. Highlights include the Kronos Quartet in Zellerbach Hall at 5pm, Pamela Rose and her celebration of female songwriters, Wild Women of Song, in Wheeler Auditorium at 4pm, SF Taiko (left) in Zellerbach at 3pm, Marcos Silva Brazilian Jazz in Lower Sproul Plaza at 1pm, and the University Chorus in Hertz Hall at 3pm. There are several dozen performances on top of that, as well as music by student ensembles at outdoor venues.